Memories of the Forgotten
by alittlebitlate
Summary: Before pain. Before betrayal. Before heartbreak. Nine timeless drabbles told from memories that were forgotten before these times.
1. Drabble of the Lonely Skeleton

**A/N: **My brain hurts from composing the complicated pieces of TSF and TDK, so I'm gonna stick with this little drabble series. It will go in reverse order from when the SH joined, so from Brook to Zoro. Based off RedKetchup's These Forgotten Times.

* * *

"Socially challenged."

That was what the village doctors called him. That was the excuse his parents gave to the neighbors when they found their children running away from Brook in fear. That was why he was picked on by the village bullies.

After he had eaten that strange fruit, he was never the same.

Brook curled up tighter in the corner of the shop, eyes not leaving the scratches of his quill as he composed a ballad. Mother was manning the shop today; Father was rather tired from all the training exercises he coached for the trainees of the military. However, instead of speaking with Brook, the dark-haired woman only had her lips pursed and refused to look at her son.

Brook stared at her for a moment more, before returning his eyes to the sheet. Mother was still angry at him for earlier that day, when the village bullies had come again to tease him about his secluded behavior. By the time Mother had found him, the bullies were all slashed up and Brook was wielding Father's shikomizue.

Despite Brook's protests that it was self-defense, he found himself apologizing repeatedly to the bullies' parents (who were not very happy) and dragged back to the instrument shop by the ear.

Mother had not spoken a word since then, and Brook was perfectly content.

* * *

"Brook! Stop that!"

Brook looked up from his piece, and relaxed his hold on his violin. It was coming out so nice, too, even if he did have trouble playing the notes, and it was a little squeaky (okay, a lot squeaky).

Mother had opened the door to his room, though she made no move to close the gap between the two. "It's about five a.m.!" she sighed, resting her hands on her hips. Her messy curly hair bounced along with her movement, a smooth beige nightgown clinging to her moderately curvy figure. "You're making too much of a racket! Your father and I are still quite tired from working!"

Her eyes scanned her son's room as if for the first time, before raising an eyebrow and striding over, grabbing a pair of pink panties that lay on Brook's desk, which was cluttered with quills, paper, and ink. "Brook? Are these _my _panties?!" she glared at her son.

Brook shrugged, not looking the least bit ashamed. "It gives me inspiration for my music," he replied simply.

"You - " Mother sighed, pressing a hand to her forehead. "Well, okay then. Don't start playing music so loudly until _after _I've had my coffee, at least, and I'll be taking my panties back." She muttered something under her breath. "It's too early in the morning for something like this."

"Liar," Brook suddenly mumbled quietly.

Mother blinked, before looking over at his son. "What did you say?" her voice took on an angry tone.

"I said you're a liar," Brook raised his voice. "You wouldn't be tired by acting as cashier for the shop. Business has been bad." his eyes darkened. "No one on this island appreciates music."

"Brook, you - "

"Not even you!" Brook scowled. "I've been raised knowing music all my life, but when I try to play the elders complain about the racket, and the children taunt me! And you always complain!"

Mother paused for a moment, raking her eyes over him. "Brook," she said. "Are you really that unhappy?"

An affirmative nod.

She turned around and stepped into the hallway, before looking behind her shoulder. She had a rare smile on her face. "Later today, I'll show you how to play the guitar, how does that sound?"

Brook blinked slowly, before an honest grin spread on his face.

"Great!"

* * *

After that incident, Brook's mood improved considerably. The young child turned into a solemn teenager, and though he had gained a famous name for himself after working in the military like Father, he never interacted with anyone.

"No one likes music, no one would like me," was always his simple reply when questioned by Mother.

It was simple. Why did no one see that? Brook didn't like human company. If he had it his way, he could stay in an isolated island and play music by himself alone for the rest of his life.

And he would be happy.

* * *

A few years later, the Rumbar Pirates docked to resupply before heading to the Grand Line. Their captain, Yorki, was a friendly man who adored music. He revealed that what Brook ate was a Devil Fruit, and he identified it, with the manual, as the Yomi Yomi no Mi. He wasn't a freak, Yorki told him. He was amazing.

Brook asked them if they would pillage towns and villages like other pirates, and, seemingly amused by the question, the captain replied.

"No, all we want is music, to sing, to be free." Yorki laughed. "What's life without that?"

And before they left, they asked Brook to join them.

And Brook gladly accepted.

* * *

Brook continued on many great adventures. He learned the captain's favorite song, and now his own, Bink's Sake, which he could play by heart with his eyes closed on any instrument.

But he closed off. After that, he claimed that he did not need much human company.

A little was enough.

Too much became stifling.

He met a small whale with a huge heart, who could not bear to part with them. Finally, after making it into the most treacherous of seas, they entrusted him to an old man named Crocus, who promised to care for him until they conquered the Grand Line.

And they swore to.

* * *

Disaster happened.

Yorki and many others were killed by a dangerous illness. Brook sent him off farewell with tears and his favorite song. They sailed off in a boat to slowly die together.

Brook became the new captain, someone now who had to bear the heavy weight of his crewmates' lives. He honed his swordsmanship and songs even more to cheer them up when they became depressed.

And then another band of pirates hit, realizing they were weakened by the deaths of their former captain and many treasured crewmates.

They fought them off, but the poison concealed in their blades had done enough. The Rumbar Pirates were going to die.

Heavy with this new knowledge, they did the only thing they could: send themselves off merrily.

And they partied until death knocked on their door.

For fifty years, the Yomi Yomi no Mi kept him in such a heart-wrenching solitude that Brook nearly went insane. The only thing he could do to comfort himself was music, which he played with hands stripped of flesh and warmth, and kept himself going with the only remaining friend he had -

_Laboon. _

He swore to meet Laboon again. Daylight would not let him, because of an unfortunate encounter with a certain Shichibukai.

In those lonely, lonely days, Brook wished for the thing that he had hated the most since childhood.

_Friends. _

* * *

A little while later, he met a certain, happy-go-lucky straw-hatted boy, who, with his ear-to-ear grin, asked him to be his comrade.

And Brook gladly went.

* * *

**A/N: **Next up is Franky! These things are so fun to write :3 Please give some feedback and tell me what I could improve, and also prompts for missing spots in their backstories. Thanks!

-alittlebitlate


	2. Drabble of the Cyborg Shipwright

**A/N: **Thanks to everyone who followed or favorited! Franky's was a bit harder, but hopefully I made it work :)

* * *

Cutty Flam hated his name.

On the ship, he was normally cast away and locked in a storage room, which was fine by him. He tinkered with several metallic gears, and by sunset he would have a working cannon, however small it was.

His father, the captain, and his mother, one of the nurses, couldn't care less about him. They considered a child a nuisance, especially when sailing the seas as a pirate.

_"D'ya know why I named ya Cutty Flam?" his father taunted one day. _

_Cutty Flam kept his head down, refusing to look at him with his own type of defiance. _

_"Aye, because it's a useless name! Perfect for a useless brat, don't ya think?!" he spat in his face. _

During battles, he was shooed below deck with a pistol in hand, ready to shoot anyone who tried looting the ship. He had killed a few already, at the tender age of ten, but his parents refused to let any softness show, and beat their son into a hard shell. Normally, they only bothered to throw him scraps from the dinner table, treating him like some pet.

Many, many days passed in the storage room, and he - not Cutty Flam, but _he _- would draw up blueprints for a ship, the greatest ship ever that could beat the ship of his parents' by far and sink them so that they drowned.

Resentment and bitterness spurred him on.

His first battleship was a pitiful little raft which had only one working cannon, which could shoot only once. When his parents found it in the storage room, he was given a beating, and thrown in an even smaller closet before locking the door shut, and he went the night hungry.

He spent two days in there.

They continued to lock him in the small closet, a stark change from the storage room. Even so, he managed to smuggle more metal scraps, and tinkered with them until dawn rose, and until night fell.

Again and again.

Again and again.

The boy, who had stripped himself free of name, tinkered with metal to create a new one.

Exactly one month later, he was allowed to roam free. And then, his father lifted him by the back of his shirt (shirt, he says, though it was merely a rag; his pants only a speedo), and sneered at him.

He gave him the finger.

He dropped him.

The cold was a stark change from the warm (almost too much in that aspect) air inside the storage room and closet, and for a moment his head went under, a steady stream of bubbles trailing from his mouth. And then, a surge of defiance -

The explosion on the ship propelled him far, far away in the water, and his world spun until his eyes shook in his head and he couldn't tell up from down and he thought his lungs would burst, before his head broke surface and he gasped in the sweetest air he'd ever tasted.

And then he begins to sink again, and his arms panic and his legs flail until he bobs up and down unsteadily and lets out as much swears as he can, and the best he can do is, inch by inch, doggie paddle toward the nearest island, which is -

A fucking _fountain _of water.

He grimaces even as he loses consciousness.

* * *

When he wakes up, he's greeted by the strange sight of a man - no, not a man, someone a little more different than that.

And then the man-thing introduces himself as Tom, the fishman who lives with a Don, who built ships from sunrise to sunset, who laughed no matter how desperate the circumstances.

He tells Tom his story, about how he was thrown off the pirate ship that was his birthplace, and omits the part where he blew it up in the end. Tom laughs at the fact that he was thrown off.

He meets the formerly-beautiful secretary named Kokoro,

He meets the infuriating blue-haired bastard (no, not him, the less-awesome one) who sneers at him and his weird name, and it's all he can do not to fly toward him with fists outstretched -

and Tom breaks them apart, laughing about how life is too short to fight, and he scowls and jeers at the older boy.

"Cutty Flam? What a weird name," he comments, looking haughty. "I'll just call you Franky."

He opens his mouth to protest, and surprisingly finds himself speechless.

* * *

A little over two decades later, when Franky - not Cutty Flam, not he, but _Franky_ - has suffered and endured and cried regrets out until he could no more, he allies with a strange boy with a straw hat and a grin like Tom's.

And he builds his dream ship, one that overtook his parents' by far.

And when the boy asks him to join, he goes with a Don.

* * *

**A/N: **Feedback would be appreciated! :3 Thanks!

-alittlebitlate


	3. Drabble of the Running Devil Child

**A/N: **Okay, I'm sort of noticing a pattern here.

Every time I update, the number of follows or faves go up, and the number of reviews stay at a depressing zero. It's a little frustrating knowing that you've written something multiple people like so much that they follow it, or they favorite it, but apparently they can't take five seconds to leave a review.

/bashes head against computer

* * *

She is running.

One day, maybe, she'll learn to love the world. She will find friends, and she will feel at ease again. But day after relentless day the girl - no, the _child_, has been hounded by the world.

Her enemy.

And later on, after a thousand days and a bit more or a bit less, she sees changes. No sleep is needed - she can stay up the entire twenty-four hours if she wishes.

And she does. Because when the world's after you, there's no time to take a breather.

And later on, after two thousand days and a bit more or a bit less, she sees more changes. Her arms have grown muscular, her legs, longer and leaner. She hates those changes, she hates them so much because it just proves that the reality she's living is _realitsrealitsreal_ and she has not yet lost hope that it's just a horrible dream that she will one day wake up from.

When the girl ages, turning from a small child into a slender teen with a habit of keeping an eye out for everything and anything, who has dabbled her fingers into more criminal organizations than countable, she gets cornered.

They are men, pirates, criminals maybe. But the way they eye her lean legs and her chest is enough to make even a normal girl, a girl with no worries but what they would wear, earn shivers up her back.

Because _it's real_.

And she doesn't shy away from using deadly force. She _can't _shy away from using deadly force because -

So many years on the run, she's not going to lose now.

And then when her arms snap their necks she flees, knowing that someone may have heard the crack. Without missing a beat, she has hid herself on a cargo ship bound for some faraway island and she could care less what it's called because all she wants is to get away as far as possible because -

_It's real. _

And she finds allies again, and betrays them again, and death after cold, cruel death has made the small teen turn into a cold woman, someone looking only to further her own benefits.

She supposes it's a funny way that fate plays when she thinks that she, the enemy of the world, the survivor of Ohara, the lone archaeologist, has probably gotten arrested more criminal organizations than the average marine.

When she turns twenty-five, she meets the Shichibukai, Crocodile.

_His grin suits his name_, was the first thing she thought about him. She realized, soon enough, that the man was cunning, that he had gotten rather impressive bounty hunters under him all for one purpose -

Pluton. The ancient weapon.

She unconsciously wrinkles her nose. No one was interested history - _their _history. The man wanted weapons? She was already making up her mind when he added that there was a Poneglyph in Alabasta.

And suddenly her breath caught because she wondered if it could be the real, true, Rio Poneglyph with True History scratched on the hard stone and her fingers clench and she bites her lip and -

she _accepts_, goddammit, she accepts to destroy an entire kingdom just for the sake of True History.

She marvels that it doesn't hit her as hard and realizes blankly that she really has become a cold woman.

* * *

So when she meets the pirates - which can't really be considered _pirates_, of course, because they are much too merry and filled with rambunctious laughter and she holds back a tear for Saul even as she kills the man intended to die for his princess.

He died, all right, but not for Princess Vivi.

And then she plays with his straw hat, his _precious _straw hat, and the boy-captain yells at him and the two of his lackeys that attack her are pitiful at best because she quickly subdues them and leaves them wondering what happened.

A smile curves on her lips and she wonders briefly if she could stop Crocodile and read the Poneglyph by herself, and without another thought she fishes out the Eternal Pose for Alabasta and the boy-captain _reaches _for it and -

_crack_

- crushes it with his hands.

And she giggles a bit more before saying farewell and disappearing, and she wonders again, how it would be like if she lived life like that, without any care in the world, reckless and foolish and young.

And she shakes her head, scolds herself, and goes back.

* * *

It's not it.

It's not it.

It's not it.

Years and years of running has honed the woman to hide the turmoil of emotions inside a calm face and posture for fear of showing weakness, but inside she's screaming because _it's not it _and the disappointment is so bitter she could cry behind that calmed shell.

And she could care less about the words of the ancient weapon that are inscribed on it because _it's not it _and she supposes that the only thing she can do for this country now is deny Crocodile the weapon.

Her final revenge.

And she has made up her mind that she will finally _die _after twenty-eight wretched years living on this earth so she hardly panics when Crocodile slashes her stomach open and the cavern begins crumbling and she could care less about the king that panics because she is feeling peace now, and there is no desperation to live left.

And then the boy-captain.

He denies her request to die, and forcefully - _forcefully _brings her outside the ancient room and she wants to scream and protest because that's the worst thing he could ever do to her, let her live when she had none left to live for but then he grins at her, a bright, merry grin, and she's reminded so much of Saul that the protests die on her lips and when she wakes up after losing consciousness again she realizes that she's _alive.__  
_

Fate was a fickle master, after all.

With nowhere to go, she finds herself walking to the ship docked at port, the ship with the jolly lamb at the front that's hardly fitting for a pirate ship, but the jolly roger's straw hat resembles so much the boy-captain's own that she barely doubts it as she climbs on board and hides.

And she hardly knows that, in the near future, her dream would be reignited with a certain carving in a golden bell over tens of thousands of meters above the sky.

And she hardly knows that, in the near future, she would meet the man of her worst nightmares after twenty years again.

And she hardly knows that, in the near future, she would choose to abandon the crew she has grown to love like a mother, but the sheer paranoia and terror keeps her going.

And she hardly knows that, the crew she had decided to join was willing to take on the world for _her sake_.

* * *

**A/N: **Realizing just now that I switched to present tense at one point but oh well.

-alittlebitlate


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